Senators Ask FTC to Deepen Probe of Google

The Senate's top-ranking antitrust officials today penned a letter to the Federal Trade Commission expressing concern over Google's business practices and "its impact on competition in Internet search and commerce."

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The Senate's top-ranking antitrust officials today penned a letter to the Federal Trade Commission expressing concern over Google's business practices and "its impact on competition in Internet search and commerce."

Sens. Herb Kohl and Michael Lee, chairman and ranking member of the Senate Judiciary antitrust committee, presided over a September hearing at which Google's Eric Schmidt defended his company's search practices. Schmidt's answers apparently did not satisfy the senators, who today asked the FTC to investigate certain aspects of Google's business.

In their letter to FTC chairman Jonathan Leibowitz, the duo said they "take no position on the ultimate legality of Google's practices under the antitrust laws and the FTC Act," but they said they remain concerned about Google's business practices and "believe these concerns warrant a thorough investigation by the FTC."

The senators reiterated concerns they brought up in September, including accusations that Google favors its own products in search results and repurposes data from rivals like Yelp without permission.

In a statement, a Google spokesman said "these letters are customary, and we appreciate that the committee reserved judgment as we continue to cooperate with the FTC. We are committed to competing fairly on the Internet's level playing field."

During September's hearing, Schmidt denied the accusations. "We use data sources that are our own because we can't engineer it any other way," Schmidt said. "I disagree with the characterization that somehow we were discriminating against [competitors]."

"I should mention that all our competitors have similar approaches and similar products to maps, places, and other things," Schmidt said.

Schmidt also downplayed the feud with Yelp, which accused Google of using its technology without permission even after the company asked for its removal. Schmidt, however, said "I felt that Yelp would be very happy with us pointing to their site and then using a little bit of their reviews, because we'd gotten those in the index, and then sending traffic to them."

But "they were not happy with that, they sent us a letter to that effect, and we took them out of the Place pages. So if you look today, you'll see that they're not in there," he concluded.

The FTC might already be investigating these issues, of course. In June, Google said the agency had started a "review of our business," but did not get specific on what types of documents the agency wanted.

In September, Schmidt urged the committee to "help us ensure that the Federal Trade Commission's inquiry remains a focused and fair process, so that we can continue creating jobs and building products that delight our users."

After the hearing, several senators had a few more questions for Schmidt, which they submitted to him in writing. The Senate Judiciary Antitrust Subcommittee released Schmidt's responses to those queries in November, which again focused on Google's competitiveness, the Android operating system, and more. Interestingly, however, Schmidt insisted that Google was not dominant in search or mobile.

Editor's Note: This story was updated Tuesday with comment from Google.

Chloe Albanesius has been with PCMag.com since April 2007, most recently as Executive Editor for News and Features. Prior to that, she worked for a year covering financial IT on Wall Street for Incisive Media. From 2002 to 2005, Chloe covered technology policy for The National Journal's Technology Daily in Washington, DC. She has held internships at NBC's Meet the Press, washingtonpost.com, the Tate Gallery press office in London, Roll Call, and Congressional Quarterly. She graduated with a bachelor's degree in journalism from American University...
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